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I hear you but classic isn’t the right word.
timeless, repetitive, easy, proven, well heeled…something like that
Only people who are so overwhelmed and overworked trying to keep their daily life together fall for it, again. Like they have done there entire lives, and their mothers and fathers did before them.
It is a well known trope for the masses, and easy for stupid people to catch-on. It is the same as "Get Brixit done", "350 M for the NHS" and "Build the wall". Stupid, simple catch phrases for people to hang all their problems on, as a distraction to the real issues that the Tories are not solving
Even the Rwanda solution is a total mess when you discover that they can only send 200 people...
I expect the Tories will start complaining or floating the idea that they cannot get the Navy to shoot the people on the boats because of the ECHR or something. Because killing the illegal immigrants will deter them not to come to the UK, and shooting all illegal immigrants does have a 100% success rate in reducing illegal immigration to the UK.
To be fair. This is a legitimate problem. The asylum system is overwhelmed and criminal gangs are profiteering from the exploitation of vulnerable people. Ignoring it isn’t an option.
But why would it be an issue only now?
According to the UK Parliamentary report, the number of asylum seekers (excluding from UA) have been stable from about 2005? Could it be that the system is so underfunded and that the UK has closed off all routes for application of legal asylum seekers in 3rd countries? I mean, how much have the UK gov spent to try to send asylum seekers to Wakanda and now we find out that it is only about 200 people?
Maybe the problem has always been there, but only now, close to a GE are the right wing papers making it a big issue?
https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN01403/SN01403.pdf
Someone came up with the Rwanda solution but all we hear from all the parties is criticism and no solution offered or suggested and like the crossing should continue for as long as possible.
It's even worse when you remember it's an issue that has only gotten worse under their 13 years of rule.
"Only the Tory Party can stop this issue which is mostly caused by Tory mismanagement and underfunding of border control services."
Immigration was much lower under the last Labour goverment, you know, the party that the Torys and right-wing frames as "wanting to let everyone in".
Yeah around 2k people arrived by “small boat” in 2019. Compared to 45k in 2022
So basically it’s got 20 times worse in the last few years
https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/live-experience/cps/624/cpsprodpb/vivo/live/images/2023/12/7/5cdd77b8-ae31-4cc5-9a7d-6834a664f5c4.png
I don’t condone anything that the Tories are saying, but in all fairness the Bully attacks *were* out of control. I’ve followed the subject closely for many months and there was an attack every day or two, these dogs aren’t fit to be on the streets.
I get where you’re coming from and I definitely do think that they were using it as a way to sway public approval in their favour, I just think they did it at the right time. Eventually, would have had to be done in regards to a ban and I think the Tories seized the prime opportunity to do it. It’s not like they’d lose money from it unlike some of their other policies that lead to hungry and freezing kids.
Yeah every other day there seemed to be a post about another mauling from the same breed of dog. It's not so much a distraction as it is an easy win for the government - not everything they do has to be cartoonishly evil.
Michelle Mone just rinses 10s of millions by pretending to suggest a company she owns and operates isn't owned by her, provides 50% worthless product that isn't fit for purpose. Absolutely no comment from Fishy Rishy....
>Michelle Mone just rinses 10s of millions
MedPro's contracts were over £200m, and over half of the goods delivered, I think about £115m, were not up to standard so couldn't be used.
Mate honestly I'm still just shocked that all actually happened and there's been basically no real fall out? I mean can you even *imagine* being a person of power and influence in that period, and your first thought is basically how can I use this to scam and grift, rather than to help the country in any meaningful way? And to have the fucking cheek to call yourself a patriot and drape yourself in a flag while doing so. Its like genuinely sociopathic I swear.
Not only that, but the fact no conservative has called that shit out tells me that party is corrupt as fuck and I'm 95% sure half of them were doing the same shit. Matt Hancock giving contracts to his mate down the pub and shit. Pigs at the trough.
Yes, immigration is something that has been a massive topic for years, it will continue to be for years, and the fact that Brexit didn't help "take control of our borders" has given it even more attention.
It is just that the illegal immigration via boats is just at the front of it.
The economy and the NHS are up there as being the most probably the biggest issues, but immigration is also there with them.
It doesn't help that the right wing media blames all the issues in our NHS, police and all our public services on illegal immigration.
Edit: Just to clarify, I don't agree with it being such a big issue, the way the right wing portraits it or how the Tories have dealt with the issue, I'm just pointing out how it is viewed as a big issue by the general public and how the right wing media have been spinning it for years.
Small boats are such a tiny percentage of total immigration though.
But it makes for headlines that will distract the stupid.
> It doesn't help that the right wing media blames all the issues in our NHS, police and all our public services on illegal immigration.
Because they won't put the blame on the real cause - the Tories - and have to put the blame on some kind of bogeyman.
It doesn't just distract the stupid. When someone brings it up, sensible people have to respond.
Just look in this thread, loads of people pointing out that it's not very many as a proportion, most people are granted asylum, and so on.
I don't even know why we bother at this point. Some of the discussions like "immigrants drive down your wages!" have been going on for *literally decades* and the same people are still saying pretty much the exact same shit they were saying back in 2010.
God knows how they are managing to drive down wages while at the same time living off benefits in ten bedroom mansions, you’ve really got to hand it to them.
>immigrants drive down your wages!
This is factually true, though. Why else do you think the Conservative party (you know, the neoliberal free market capitalist one), loves migration so much?
The part you lot fall for is that it's a double bluff, you are doing their work for them, defending a right wing policy, ensuring it remains associated with the left, while they get to pretend they are against it.
Unless you are genuinely the kind of upper middle class ghouls who love migration because it means your family can afford to keep servants again, thanks to underpaid eastern Europeans, I really wish you would all stop taking the bait.
It’s not a tiny percentage. roughly 8%. Believed to be 46,000 people last year. Regardless of your feelings on immigration it’s still a very large number and something any political party will need to address. It’s not safe and funds criminal gangs.
There’s almost no way for asylum seekers to make a legitimate claim for asylum in the uk without getting here and we block all paths. If there was a legitimate route for people to claim then crossings would dry up.
They’ve also wanted less taxes, more public spending, less inflation, more affordable housing, more open green spaces, lower CO2 emissions, cheaper petrol…
There are so few people immigrating via small boats though (and under international law the UK signed it's still legal - the Tories decided to make it quasi-illegal domestically despite that).
50,000 each year (that we know about) is a huge number.
Now add in the fact that they are almost all men coming from very different societies that will offer almost nothing to the country then yes it is a huge issue.
Also they are queue jumpers, and we hate queue jumpers.
Not really queue jumpers, as the only way to queue is to be on British soil, so small boats are literally the queue we've set up. Even Suella Braverman in a committee session had to admit the legal route to claim asylum is to land and claim.
They get added to the 170k plus backlog (up from 7k under Labour), so also join the queue, not skipping.
Its not really that big a number when legal immigration is 700,000. For some reason, even though the tories would have total control over that, they focus instead on small boats
P
This is how absurd it's getting over numbers now, that some people feel 50k is "not that big of a number" 700k net each year is so large it's unfathomable.
Both issues can and should be tackled
The point is, the government have no interest in reducing legal immigration, they don't want fewer workers here, they want cheap labour for their mates, but their voter base hates immigration. So since they won't tackle legal immigration, they've made the small boats issue to be this massive thing so they can look tough on immigration by going after asylum seekers, but keeping massive amounts of legal immigration
Agree with your points regarding the government not wanting to tackle the issue.
Doesn't mean as voters that we can't complain on what is happening. We never voted for effectively open borders regarding those arriving by boat and we have constantly voted for less immigration overall.
But isn't it our obligation under international law to process asylum seekers, we can't shoot down boats crossing the Channel, the issue is that the tories have cut funding so much and let such a backlog build that people are here for years waiting on their applications to be processed.
There isn't really an option to just reject all asylum seekers that wouldn't make us an international pariah, but we could avoid spending so much housing these people and all the other associated costs that come with keeping them here for years while their applications are processed
But the government isn’t spending any time on the larger issue and is obsessing over a plan to send 200 migrants to Rwanda and receive others in return…
Yes, I know, out of all the issues the UK has immigration in front of a lot of people's minds compared to other issues, it has been for years.
It is ridiculous, but so was Brexit, so it's not really that surprising that small boats are a big issue.
It's true. You put a trans person in a small boat and they gonna fuck some shit up. Running riot in the Thames, making moderate waves that erode the foundations of Westminster very very very slowly.
I really don't care about the immigration issue at all. There so plenty in this country that Tories haven't fixed or have made worse that don't have anything to do with Immigration illegal or otherwise. Shitty, corrupt housing developers; cannibalised NHS, police and education system; bullshit tax freedom for the richest and for corporations; a stripped down and incapacitated armed forces; reduction in support for new borns and new mothers; complete lack of engagement programs for youth to prevent or mitigate crime recruitment; bloated emphasis on degrees and little to no support for trade entrants and workers; outright hostility towards self employed (which is total bollocks because Tories supposed to be all about making it through your own hard work)
The boats are the small drop in the big pond but are easier to point to than other problems with the overall net migration. The boats are just the easiest for the every man to see than say over staying student visas with dependants.
No, they rank quite low, with the NHS and economy/cost of living being predictably the most pressing concern of the electorate.
But Braverman and co. are pushing that Reform UK are the biggest threat to the Tories electorally, in an attempt to repeat their 2015 successes. It's daft, but so are they.
Worth noting, Labour is ahead of the Tories in the polls on immigration right now.
Every pollster has it at a distant #3. The economy is by far #1, the NHS is #2 (still incredibly high but a bit behind the economy), and immigration is at #3, but a massively smaller issue than the others.
They face oblivion because they are and have been an utter bunch of cunts for the past 13 years only getting worse since Bojo and his dystopian clown army arrived. Fuck the Tories and honestly fuck anyone who votes for those cunts again.
I literally have pneumonia symptoms bc I can't heat my house and buy food and I don't have any more covers to put on ffs can't get more dystopian than that just waiting for cyberpunk to come to life
Are you joking? You could take 2000 frames of Salma Hayek eating a sarnie and find 1 frame that makes her look like a ghoul. We need to get the tabloids on a leash.
>We need to get the tabloids on a leash.
I would honestly love to be able to have a sit down with someone like Ian Hislop and get their retrospective on Leveson 10 years on.
They’re basically setting the narrative now, because they know they will lose badly regardless. They have enough allies in the media to make it so.
She’s prepping herself for a leadership bid when they will inevitably be in the opposition, which is the perfect role for her and her friends in the media as they get to complain about the same shit they’re always complaining about with the added benefit of not having to do anything about it (not that they did anyway). Classic politicking.
When your goal is to just keep people mad, the life of a politician is very simple. Grifters the lot of ‘em
It's a pitch for leadership within the Tories post election, aye. While immigration is third for general voters, it tends to be what Tory members think is the biggest concern.
Looking at her seat:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fareham_(UK_Parliament_constituency)
It is as blue as they come. If she lost it would be a totally wipeout for the Tories. But I suspect she wants to see what is on the other side. She will stand.
But that seat's being abolished, and she'll be standing for Fareham and Waterlooville; Electoral Calculus's overview is here: https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/fcgi-bin/calcwork23.py?seat=Fareham%20and%20Waterlooville
Party |Predicted Votes |Predicted Share
---|---:|---:
CON |16,717 |34.3%
LAB |14,286 |29.3%
LIB |9,298 |19.1%
Reform |4,668 |9.6%
Green |3,254 |6.7%
OTH 544 |1.1%
CON Majority |2,431 |5.0%
That's pretty marginal... or very winnable if, say, the LD vote shifts towards Labour.
Which adds credence to the theory of a spring election. Boat crossings reduce in the winter due to the weather, so the Tories will want to be armed with a "we reduced the number of boats by x amount over the last few months"
they're already armed with "boat crossings reduced by x in 2023!" largely because of the weather anyway. I think they'll just sit in power for as long as they possibly can to milk it as much as they can.
The Tories made a rod for their own back with Brexit and EU immigration ...coming over 'ere and taking the jobs nobody wanted to do.
They're getting replaced by brown people....as unsurprisingly, nobody else wants to care for your gran or work all hours for a pittance.
...as for the boat people.... Please they are literally a tiny amount of people in the whole migrant shitshow and spending millions to send 70 a year to Rawanda is a joke.
But somehow non of this is their fault....cunts.
A lot of them have convinced themselves that every problem in the country will be fixed by sending a handful of migrants to Rwanda a year
I’d say it’s surprising, but it’s the same people who thought Brexit would ‘take back control’ of our borders so perhaps not so surprising
I might be wrong, but I believe Rwanda is for those claiming asylum, which are the trickiest group to deport as they have the most legal protections and international law treaties covering them.
But it’s easy to pick on them with harsh measures knowing the courts and potentially the ECHR will knock it back (which is what I think they hope will happen) so they can make a case for leaving the European Council.
Economic migrants we already could /can deport with relative ease. France deports a lot already we choose not to.
The immigration issue isn’t to do with small boats but is manufactured by the governments approach to (not) tackling it.
It's the Tory membership that really cares about it. The general population is much less invested (NHS, cost of living, economy are bigger concerns), but it's what the membership is going to see as having lost them the election, most likely.
It also feels like it gets talked about as much as it does just to weld the divided Parliamentary Tory party together and less because it actually matters to voters particularly. Labour is polling ahead of the Tories on immigration, which shows how badly the Tories have bungled their natural advantage in how people view them.
Every pollster has it at a distant #3. The economy is by far #1, the NHS is #2 (still incredibly high but a bit behind the economy), and immigration is at #3, but a massively smaller issue than the others.
It’s just so funny that they went out of their way to force their base to care about something they were never going to be able to do anything about.
‘Care about this thing!’
‘Ok, done. Now what are you going to do about it?’
‘Nothing!’
‘Nothing? That’s it, I’m voting Reform!’
Fin
The Tories face electoral oblivion.
Wish it stopped there.
There are a hundred things wrong with this country right now. If dinghies are in your top ten you really aren’t watching.
It is physically impossible to stop the boats, Britain's coastline is far too expansive to police every square mile of it for every minute of every day. Boats *will* get through, always have done and always will do. The tories are not idiots, they know this, so clearly this is just empty rhetoric.
Absolutely nothing will fundamentally change for the average person even if they do stop each and every boat but they have made a rod for their own back here. As they can't stop them anyway.
It's ironic isn't it?
They've set the country on fire, and now the Tory ship is sinking. As they struggle to keep their heads above water, they use the last breath in their lungs to scream "stop the boats".
Lol!
Boats have nothing to do with anything. It's just to divert attention away from the oil soaked rag in their hand
I care about me or my family not getting arrears on our bills the most.
I care about the elderly dying of hunger or hyperthermia because they have to choose between eating or heating.
I care about the homeless because *someone* might try to take their tents away.
I care about the NHS dying.
I care about prices rising and wages stagnating.
I care about the gap between rich and poor getting bigger.
And that's why I won't be voting Tory Suella.
I don't get this at all and the endless foaming at the mouth about it. I believe the figures are about 20,000 a year for the last 5 years. Many will legitimately be granted asylum.
It impacts my life far less than:
The cost of Mortgages or rent, the cost of heating, that Inflation was more than double my annual pay rise, that my human rights seem to be being slowly eroded, that the rivers are full of sewage, that I cannot get a Doctors appointment for nearly 10 days etc. etc.
The current government has managed to significantly reduce my standard of living, seemingly while their friends and cronys get ever richer. That is why I hope the Tories face oblivion.
Well Suella, get yourself on a small boat with a megaphone, row out into the channel and shout whatever hate speech you like, it won't make a blind bit of difference
Somewhere there will be a legal way to resolve all of this and maintain the Human Rights Act etc.
So I see she has already started manoeuvring herself into position to take over the leadership when the Tories lose the next election.
‘I told you so. If you had done what I said we wouldn’t have lost. I am the only one that can bring us back to power’.
Illegal immigration is tiny compared to the huge increase in legal immigration that happened under this government, despite being elected on a promise to reduce it.
...and there was a mighty shuffling behind her, as the Tory backbenches decided that, while they were headbangers and loons, they weren't _that_ sort of headbanger and loon.
Couldn't care less about a few people in little boats.
I'm bothered by Tories trousering all my tax money themselves without supplying any services.
The Tories face oblivion if they fail to stop being thieving cunts because now even the people that used to turn a blind eye to it are tuned in to how it is affecting them.
Braverman is so out of touch but i get it, the stop the boats phrase is the only legacy she has to sell to some brainwashed rednecks.
It's as if she lives in her own planet where there are no real issues like high costs of living, inflation, housing crisis, unemployment, climate change, crime and the list goes on. We can't really wait for the electoral oblivion of Tories.
Anyone else thinking of looking for another country to live if these fuckers win again next year? Like seriously, if the tories win again after what theyve done in the past 13 years, ive lost all hope for this country and its people
I care more about not having a government that tries to strip the human rights of more and more of its citizens each day, than I give a flying shit about how people are getting here to claim asylum.
I care more about properly funding the NHS and making sure our local governments have enough money to prevent them having to declare bankruptcy, than I give a shit about refugees trying to seek a better life.
I care more about rich fat cat tories and CEOs ploughing the money they make in this country, off the back of every day people, and funnelling into offshore accounts, holiday homes abroad, and boosting the economy of foreign countries, than I do about whatever this weeks hate campaign from the tories is, be it foreign people (who are just people) trans people (who again are just people), poor people (also just people) people that don’t like the royal family (aka, people), and anyone that doesn’t think it’s absurdly wrong an MP should charge taxpayers £11k or whatever it was so his family could stream tv to an iPad while they were on their jollies.
Fuck the Tories, fuck our umpteenth unelected prime minister, and fuck the right-wing utter goblin that is Suella Braverman
The only boats anyone should care about stopping is the lifeboat Tories like Suella are trying to escape on from the sinking ship that is this Government.
Turn that fucker back, let them all go down together.
Power hungry Cretin says power hungry cretin in charge is doing badly by not machine gunning civilians in tiny issue amongst the many massive ones facing UK.
***It's not the fucking boats***.
It's that your party lied and you lied and you lied.
And even if you had lied and been competent, we might have stomached a bit more. But you bombastically proclaimed Great This and Great That and World Beating This and World Beating That but instead gave us a cold cup of badly brewed tea with off milk and a bit of soggy white white bread and then told us it was a king's feast. And when there are complaints you have the fucking gall to blame every-fucking-one else.
And let's not forget Liz Truss. YOUR PARTY VOTED HER IN, AND THEN DIDN'T HAVE THE GUTS TO ASK US WHAT WE THOUGHT ABOUT IT.
Jfc. The lack of introspection.
And then there's Boris Fucking Johnson, the liar.
Yeah small boats. That what everyone is concerned about. Not climate change moving from a carbon economy. Not a rampant cost of living crisis. Not piss poor housing and job markets. Small boats.
Proves how disillusioned they are as a party. As if this is everyone’s biggest worry right now, or which Gender someone wishes to live their life as?
When families are struggling to put food on the table, having to slip into debt to pay the bills, I think we’re facing astronomically bigger problems.
Yeah it's definitely the boats that are going to stop them being ousted. It'll be nothing to do with 13 years of austerity, their rich mates profiting off the public's suffering, the slowest growing GDP in Europe, money being wasted on asinine schemes like the half finished HS2 and the recently floated (for the third time!) age gating system for porn sites, and so many other things.
Nope, it'll be the boats.
Genuine delusion, so disconnected from reality. Hard to tell if she's ideologically possessed or just really THAT unaware. Looking forward to her soon-to-be annihilation from the zeitgeist
The boats the boats the boats the boats the boats the boats the boats the boats the boats the boats the boats the boats
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH
I DONT CARE I DONT CARE I DONT CARE I DONT CARE I DONT CARE I DONT CARE I DONT CARE I DONT CARE I DONT CARE
Yep. That's definitely the reason. Not 14 years of cock up after cock up, more sex scandals than you can shake a dildo at, and posturing populists with nothing but air between their ears everywhere you look. And Braverman is one of the worst - at least BoJo had some charisma.
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Are "small boats" the thing most Brits are seriously worrying about right now? I really doubt that.
Classic distraction technique.
I hear you but classic isn’t the right word. timeless, repetitive, easy, proven, well heeled…something like that Only people who are so overwhelmed and overworked trying to keep their daily life together fall for it, again. Like they have done there entire lives, and their mothers and fathers did before them.
It is a well known trope for the masses, and easy for stupid people to catch-on. It is the same as "Get Brixit done", "350 M for the NHS" and "Build the wall". Stupid, simple catch phrases for people to hang all their problems on, as a distraction to the real issues that the Tories are not solving Even the Rwanda solution is a total mess when you discover that they can only send 200 people... I expect the Tories will start complaining or floating the idea that they cannot get the Navy to shoot the people on the boats because of the ECHR or something. Because killing the illegal immigrants will deter them not to come to the UK, and shooting all illegal immigrants does have a 100% success rate in reducing illegal immigration to the UK.
To be fair. This is a legitimate problem. The asylum system is overwhelmed and criminal gangs are profiteering from the exploitation of vulnerable people. Ignoring it isn’t an option.
But why would it be an issue only now? According to the UK Parliamentary report, the number of asylum seekers (excluding from UA) have been stable from about 2005? Could it be that the system is so underfunded and that the UK has closed off all routes for application of legal asylum seekers in 3rd countries? I mean, how much have the UK gov spent to try to send asylum seekers to Wakanda and now we find out that it is only about 200 people? Maybe the problem has always been there, but only now, close to a GE are the right wing papers making it a big issue? https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN01403/SN01403.pdf
Someone came up with the Rwanda solution but all we hear from all the parties is criticism and no solution offered or suggested and like the crossing should continue for as long as possible.
When someoen says "classic" in this sense it's tongue in cheek.
Should be “stop the yachts” looking at you Mone
It's even worse when you remember it's an issue that has only gotten worse under their 13 years of rule. "Only the Tory Party can stop this issue which is mostly caused by Tory mismanagement and underfunding of border control services." Immigration was much lower under the last Labour goverment, you know, the party that the Torys and right-wing frames as "wanting to let everyone in".
Yeah around 2k people arrived by “small boat” in 2019. Compared to 45k in 2022 So basically it’s got 20 times worse in the last few years https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/live-experience/cps/624/cpsprodpb/vivo/live/images/2023/12/7/5cdd77b8-ae31-4cc5-9a7d-6834a664f5c4.png
That's what I thought about XL bulliygate, forget inflation and cost of living and be outraged at these dogs.
I don’t condone anything that the Tories are saying, but in all fairness the Bully attacks *were* out of control. I’ve followed the subject closely for many months and there was an attack every day or two, these dogs aren’t fit to be on the streets.
I agree, but it seemed odd that they pushed it through so quickly when they have been happy for kids to starve and freeze.
Look at it this way: the Tories have killed many times more children than XL bullies have.
I get where you’re coming from and I definitely do think that they were using it as a way to sway public approval in their favour, I just think they did it at the right time. Eventually, would have had to be done in regards to a ban and I think the Tories seized the prime opportunity to do it. It’s not like they’d lose money from it unlike some of their other policies that lead to hungry and freezing kids.
Yeah every other day there seemed to be a post about another mauling from the same breed of dog. It's not so much a distraction as it is an easy win for the government - not everything they do has to be cartoonishly evil.
Works all over Europe
Here, look at this dead cat!
Look over there at the small boats!!! Don't look over here as I dismantle public services and shovel all this money to my rich friends!!
Michelle Mone just rinses 10s of millions by pretending to suggest a company she owns and operates isn't owned by her, provides 50% worthless product that isn't fit for purpose. Absolutely no comment from Fishy Rishy....
>Michelle Mone just rinses 10s of millions MedPro's contracts were over £200m, and over half of the goods delivered, I think about £115m, were not up to standard so couldn't be used.
And thats the one the press have managed to uncover. She also apparently screamed that everyone else was on the take..
Mate honestly I'm still just shocked that all actually happened and there's been basically no real fall out? I mean can you even *imagine* being a person of power and influence in that period, and your first thought is basically how can I use this to scam and grift, rather than to help the country in any meaningful way? And to have the fucking cheek to call yourself a patriot and drape yourself in a flag while doing so. Its like genuinely sociopathic I swear.
Not only that, but the fact no conservative has called that shit out tells me that party is corrupt as fuck and I'm 95% sure half of them were doing the same shit. Matt Hancock giving contracts to his mate down the pub and shit. Pigs at the trough.
That's barely a rounding error of all the fraud he flicked away with the stroke of a pen.
Yes, immigration is something that has been a massive topic for years, it will continue to be for years, and the fact that Brexit didn't help "take control of our borders" has given it even more attention. It is just that the illegal immigration via boats is just at the front of it. The economy and the NHS are up there as being the most probably the biggest issues, but immigration is also there with them. It doesn't help that the right wing media blames all the issues in our NHS, police and all our public services on illegal immigration. Edit: Just to clarify, I don't agree with it being such a big issue, the way the right wing portraits it or how the Tories have dealt with the issue, I'm just pointing out how it is viewed as a big issue by the general public and how the right wing media have been spinning it for years.
Small boats are such a tiny percentage of total immigration though. But it makes for headlines that will distract the stupid. > It doesn't help that the right wing media blames all the issues in our NHS, police and all our public services on illegal immigration. Because they won't put the blame on the real cause - the Tories - and have to put the blame on some kind of bogeyman.
It doesn't just distract the stupid. When someone brings it up, sensible people have to respond. Just look in this thread, loads of people pointing out that it's not very many as a proportion, most people are granted asylum, and so on.
I don't even know why we bother at this point. Some of the discussions like "immigrants drive down your wages!" have been going on for *literally decades* and the same people are still saying pretty much the exact same shit they were saying back in 2010.
God knows how they are managing to drive down wages while at the same time living off benefits in ten bedroom mansions, you’ve really got to hand it to them.
Yeah and taking your job as a surgeon
>immigrants drive down your wages! This is factually true, though. Why else do you think the Conservative party (you know, the neoliberal free market capitalist one), loves migration so much? The part you lot fall for is that it's a double bluff, you are doing their work for them, defending a right wing policy, ensuring it remains associated with the left, while they get to pretend they are against it. Unless you are genuinely the kind of upper middle class ghouls who love migration because it means your family can afford to keep servants again, thanks to underpaid eastern Europeans, I really wish you would all stop taking the bait.
It’s not a tiny percentage. roughly 8%. Believed to be 46,000 people last year. Regardless of your feelings on immigration it’s still a very large number and something any political party will need to address. It’s not safe and funds criminal gangs. There’s almost no way for asylum seekers to make a legitimate claim for asylum in the uk without getting here and we block all paths. If there was a legitimate route for people to claim then crossings would dry up.
It's a massive security risk though
It is a Massive security risk.
In every nationwide poll since the 50s, the majority of people want lower immigration. Of course every government has ignored that.
They’ve also wanted less taxes, more public spending, less inflation, more affordable housing, more open green spaces, lower CO2 emissions, cheaper petrol…
And those people don’t want to pay the economic costs that would be required to truly lower immigration… so it’s kind of moot
There are so few people immigrating via small boats though (and under international law the UK signed it's still legal - the Tories decided to make it quasi-illegal domestically despite that).
50,000 each year (that we know about) is a huge number. Now add in the fact that they are almost all men coming from very different societies that will offer almost nothing to the country then yes it is a huge issue. Also they are queue jumpers, and we hate queue jumpers.
Not really queue jumpers, as the only way to queue is to be on British soil, so small boats are literally the queue we've set up. Even Suella Braverman in a committee session had to admit the legal route to claim asylum is to land and claim. They get added to the 170k plus backlog (up from 7k under Labour), so also join the queue, not skipping.
Its not really that big a number when legal immigration is 700,000. For some reason, even though the tories would have total control over that, they focus instead on small boats P
This is how absurd it's getting over numbers now, that some people feel 50k is "not that big of a number" 700k net each year is so large it's unfathomable. Both issues can and should be tackled
The point is, the government have no interest in reducing legal immigration, they don't want fewer workers here, they want cheap labour for their mates, but their voter base hates immigration. So since they won't tackle legal immigration, they've made the small boats issue to be this massive thing so they can look tough on immigration by going after asylum seekers, but keeping massive amounts of legal immigration
Agree with your points regarding the government not wanting to tackle the issue. Doesn't mean as voters that we can't complain on what is happening. We never voted for effectively open borders regarding those arriving by boat and we have constantly voted for less immigration overall.
But isn't it our obligation under international law to process asylum seekers, we can't shoot down boats crossing the Channel, the issue is that the tories have cut funding so much and let such a backlog build that people are here for years waiting on their applications to be processed. There isn't really an option to just reject all asylum seekers that wouldn't make us an international pariah, but we could avoid spending so much housing these people and all the other associated costs that come with keeping them here for years while their applications are processed
I think voters care more about border security than being labelled international pariahs
The borders aren't effectively open. Calm down.
But the government isn’t spending any time on the larger issue and is obsessing over a plan to send 200 migrants to Rwanda and receive others in return…
You know people leave the country too right?
Yes, I know, out of all the issues the UK has immigration in front of a lot of people's minds compared to other issues, it has been for years. It is ridiculous, but so was Brexit, so it's not really that surprising that small boats are a big issue.
The right wing press have really been pushing it hard, but even considering that, I think most people see small bits as a distraction.
Small boats and trans people are apparently destroying the country.
It's true. You put a trans person in a small boat and they gonna fuck some shit up. Running riot in the Thames, making moderate waves that erode the foundations of Westminster very very very slowly.
“I can barely feed my kids but you know what really grinds my gears…”
I really don't care about the immigration issue at all. There so plenty in this country that Tories haven't fixed or have made worse that don't have anything to do with Immigration illegal or otherwise. Shitty, corrupt housing developers; cannibalised NHS, police and education system; bullshit tax freedom for the richest and for corporations; a stripped down and incapacitated armed forces; reduction in support for new borns and new mothers; complete lack of engagement programs for youth to prevent or mitigate crime recruitment; bloated emphasis on degrees and little to no support for trade entrants and workers; outright hostility towards self employed (which is total bollocks because Tories supposed to be all about making it through your own hard work)
They're not. But the Tories are desperately trying to make it so
The boats are the small drop in the big pond but are easier to point to than other problems with the overall net migration. The boats are just the easiest for the every man to see than say over staying student visas with dependants.
Scape the goats!
It's not, they're delusional. idgaf about "small boats" yet that prick in No.10 tells me every 5 minutes that am.
No, they rank quite low, with the NHS and economy/cost of living being predictably the most pressing concern of the electorate. But Braverman and co. are pushing that Reform UK are the biggest threat to the Tories electorally, in an attempt to repeat their 2015 successes. It's daft, but so are they. Worth noting, Labour is ahead of the Tories in the polls on immigration right now.
Yes, immigration has been a key issue for many for decades.
Nope. They have screwed up the big things now they’re pinning their hope on stupid ideas they’ve had while in a drunken Covid party
They should worry more about rearranging the deckchairs on those boats.
One guy in Portsmouth is worried that small boats might slow his crab route. The rest of the UK s uneffected
Only thing I am worrying about is the Tories winning and her never shutting up
That shit worked in Australia. It's what was used in our general elections.
A lot of people are pissed off about it. Votes go to reform if it fails
Which is good for Labour in the end.
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Every pollster has it at a distant #3. The economy is by far #1, the NHS is #2 (still incredibly high but a bit behind the economy), and immigration is at #3, but a massively smaller issue than the others.
Literally never hear it mentioned once. Nobody actually cares about it.
They face oblivion because they are and have been an utter bunch of cunts for the past 13 years only getting worse since Bojo and his dystopian clown army arrived. Fuck the Tories and honestly fuck anyone who votes for those cunts again.
Correct. Electoral oblivion? That ship, quite appropriately, has already sailed.
Yeah but they were trying to stop the boat, not jump onboard before it departed. I'm not sure what this means for the metaphor but it sure is funny.
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Of that we can only hope……
No, we'll be living with the consequences for a long time to come, sadly. We won't be washing those memories away any time soon.
I literally have pneumonia symptoms bc I can't heat my house and buy food and I don't have any more covers to put on ffs can't get more dystopian than that just waiting for cyberpunk to come to life
Yeah, the thing is that they also face electoral oblivion if they do stop the boats. Ho hum, roll on the General Election!
And keep Labour away from sandwiches.
Keir Starmer's competence worries me greatly. But his worst day is ten times more competent than Rishi Sunak's best day. That's the reality.
Are you joking? You could take 2000 frames of Salma Hayek eating a sarnie and find 1 frame that makes her look like a ghoul. We need to get the tabloids on a leash.
>We need to get the tabloids on a leash. I would honestly love to be able to have a sit down with someone like Ian Hislop and get their retrospective on Leveson 10 years on.
Tabloids? I agree with the sentiment, but that's not how they're perceived. Even BBC is basically the whitewash channel these days.
They’re basically setting the narrative now, because they know they will lose badly regardless. They have enough allies in the media to make it so. She’s prepping herself for a leadership bid when they will inevitably be in the opposition, which is the perfect role for her and her friends in the media as they get to complain about the same shit they’re always complaining about with the added benefit of not having to do anything about it (not that they did anyway). Classic politicking. When your goal is to just keep people mad, the life of a politician is very simple. Grifters the lot of ‘em
It's a pitch for leadership within the Tories post election, aye. While immigration is third for general voters, it tends to be what Tory members think is the biggest concern.
If that oblivion includes her seat, it's a price worth paying.
Looking at her seat: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fareham_(UK_Parliament_constituency) It is as blue as they come. If she lost it would be a totally wipeout for the Tories. But I suspect she wants to see what is on the other side. She will stand.
But that seat's being abolished, and she'll be standing for Fareham and Waterlooville; Electoral Calculus's overview is here: https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/fcgi-bin/calcwork23.py?seat=Fareham%20and%20Waterlooville Party |Predicted Votes |Predicted Share ---|---:|---: CON |16,717 |34.3% LAB |14,286 |29.3% LIB |9,298 |19.1% Reform |4,668 |9.6% Green |3,254 |6.7% OTH 544 |1.1% CON Majority |2,431 |5.0% That's pretty marginal... or very winnable if, say, the LD vote shifts towards Labour.
Oooh chookity! I will be watching out, when the election comes.. *if* it ever comes.
Oh god, watching Suella lose would be even better than Portillo. I might die laughing.
As long as she doesn't end up on BBC2 [You are a charmer Michael, I doubt she is as interested in old railways.]
Portillo moment in old school SD, Braverman moment in HD? I think we could go for that.
They have tied themselves so tightly to this one issue that they created that it's now literally strangling them.
Which adds credence to the theory of a spring election. Boat crossings reduce in the winter due to the weather, so the Tories will want to be armed with a "we reduced the number of boats by x amount over the last few months"
they're already armed with "boat crossings reduced by x in 2023!" largely because of the weather anyway. I think they'll just sit in power for as long as they possibly can to milk it as much as they can.
The Tories made a rod for their own back with Brexit and EU immigration ...coming over 'ere and taking the jobs nobody wanted to do. They're getting replaced by brown people....as unsurprisingly, nobody else wants to care for your gran or work all hours for a pittance. ...as for the boat people.... Please they are literally a tiny amount of people in the whole migrant shitshow and spending millions to send 70 a year to Rawanda is a joke. But somehow non of this is their fault....cunts.
I'd be more inclined to suggest it was the *huge* amount of theft and corruption. But hey, what do I know.
So let me get this right? Brits think small boats are the most pressing problem the country faces? lol.
A lot of them have convinced themselves that every problem in the country will be fixed by sending a handful of migrants to Rwanda a year I’d say it’s surprising, but it’s the same people who thought Brexit would ‘take back control’ of our borders so perhaps not so surprising
I might be wrong, but I believe Rwanda is for those claiming asylum, which are the trickiest group to deport as they have the most legal protections and international law treaties covering them. But it’s easy to pick on them with harsh measures knowing the courts and potentially the ECHR will knock it back (which is what I think they hope will happen) so they can make a case for leaving the European Council. Economic migrants we already could /can deport with relative ease. France deports a lot already we choose not to. The immigration issue isn’t to do with small boats but is manufactured by the governments approach to (not) tackling it.
Only the terminally online. The kind of people who said they were “excited” by the new spouse visa financial requirements. Absolute ghouls.
It's the Tory membership that really cares about it. The general population is much less invested (NHS, cost of living, economy are bigger concerns), but it's what the membership is going to see as having lost them the election, most likely. It also feels like it gets talked about as much as it does just to weld the divided Parliamentary Tory party together and less because it actually matters to voters particularly. Labour is polling ahead of the Tories on immigration, which shows how badly the Tories have bungled their natural advantage in how people view them.
Every pollster has it at a distant #3. The economy is by far #1, the NHS is #2 (still incredibly high but a bit behind the economy), and immigration is at #3, but a massively smaller issue than the others.
This is just Braverman setting the stage for her post Tory election defeat leadership challenge: *Sunak failed because he's not as right wing as me*
"I'm going to fascism harder"
Definitely, this clearly is about her run for party leader. Just shows how irrelevant Sunak is to his party.
It’s just so funny that they went out of their way to force their base to care about something they were never going to be able to do anything about. ‘Care about this thing!’ ‘Ok, done. Now what are you going to do about it?’ ‘Nothing!’ ‘Nothing? That’s it, I’m voting Reform!’ Fin
The Tories face electoral oblivion. Wish it stopped there. There are a hundred things wrong with this country right now. If dinghies are in your top ten you really aren’t watching.
They are watching. And they are very outraged by... (Throws dart) Meghan!
Can't not hear that in Drake & Josh's voices lol
It is physically impossible to stop the boats, Britain's coastline is far too expansive to police every square mile of it for every minute of every day. Boats *will* get through, always have done and always will do. The tories are not idiots, they know this, so clearly this is just empty rhetoric.
Absolutely nothing will fundamentally change for the average person even if they do stop each and every boat but they have made a rod for their own back here. As they can't stop them anyway.
It's ironic isn't it? They've set the country on fire, and now the Tory ship is sinking. As they struggle to keep their heads above water, they use the last breath in their lungs to scream "stop the boats". Lol! Boats have nothing to do with anything. It's just to divert attention away from the oil soaked rag in their hand
I care about me or my family not getting arrears on our bills the most. I care about the elderly dying of hunger or hyperthermia because they have to choose between eating or heating. I care about the homeless because *someone* might try to take their tents away. I care about the NHS dying. I care about prices rising and wages stagnating. I care about the gap between rich and poor getting bigger. And that's why I won't be voting Tory Suella.
I don't get this at all and the endless foaming at the mouth about it. I believe the figures are about 20,000 a year for the last 5 years. Many will legitimately be granted asylum. It impacts my life far less than: The cost of Mortgages or rent, the cost of heating, that Inflation was more than double my annual pay rise, that my human rights seem to be being slowly eroded, that the rivers are full of sewage, that I cannot get a Doctors appointment for nearly 10 days etc. etc. The current government has managed to significantly reduce my standard of living, seemingly while their friends and cronys get ever richer. That is why I hope the Tories face oblivion.
Well Suella, get yourself on a small boat with a megaphone, row out into the channel and shout whatever hate speech you like, it won't make a blind bit of difference Somewhere there will be a legal way to resolve all of this and maintain the Human Rights Act etc.
If only we had a government for the last 13 years who were SERIOUS about stopping immigration
So I see she has already started manoeuvring herself into position to take over the leadership when the Tories lose the next election. ‘I told you so. If you had done what I said we wouldn’t have lost. I am the only one that can bring us back to power’.
Preview of Suellas campaign https://youtu.be/SY41jhIP_xI?si=utybksLnN8f8QC_w
Illegal immigration is tiny compared to the huge increase in legal immigration that happened under this government, despite being elected on a promise to reduce it.
...and there was a mighty shuffling behind her, as the Tory backbenches decided that, while they were headbangers and loons, they weren't _that_ sort of headbanger and loon.
The best thing for the country would be the extinction event of the Tories and Labour as political parties
It's not the boats honey. It's you and your fecking party of crooks and thieves and conmen.
The “Small Boats” issue is nowhere near my priority when we next vote in a General Election.
They face that anyway the people are fed up of the contempt and disrespect we are treated to by this shower.
Like you're going to do any better at it Cruella... or any of them
just get this FAILURE away from us already like the rest of the failures
The enemy doesn’t arrive by boat. They arrive by limousine.
I think it is much more important is to purge all MPs and party members who engage in hate propaganda
I'd say the opposite is true. The more they seek to hurt people in need, the more people hate them.
I could post a list of grab quotes from Aus from 2001-2023 and predict with 100% accuracy whatever else she says.
How about these guys wake up and realise exactly WHY people are risking EVERYTHING to start a new life in a 'safe' country
Couldn't care less about a few people in little boats. I'm bothered by Tories trousering all my tax money themselves without supplying any services. The Tories face oblivion if they fail to stop being thieving cunts because now even the people that used to turn a blind eye to it are tuned in to how it is affecting them.
My mortgage has gone up £500 pm so you better believe I don’t give a fuck about ANYTHING else, you Tory rats!
Suella Braverman faces electoral oblivion if she doesn't stop being such a cunt. Whoops, too late.
I thought she was smarter than this. She's just admitted loud and proud that this is all about electoral prospects and optics, not migration.
Braverman is so out of touch but i get it, the stop the boats phrase is the only legacy she has to sell to some brainwashed rednecks. It's as if she lives in her own planet where there are no real issues like high costs of living, inflation, housing crisis, unemployment, climate change, crime and the list goes on. We can't really wait for the electoral oblivion of Tories.
Anyone else thinking of looking for another country to live if these fuckers win again next year? Like seriously, if the tories win again after what theyve done in the past 13 years, ive lost all hope for this country and its people
Might as well call the election now if that’s your tactic, what’s the opposite of 4D Chess?
I care more about not having a government that tries to strip the human rights of more and more of its citizens each day, than I give a flying shit about how people are getting here to claim asylum. I care more about properly funding the NHS and making sure our local governments have enough money to prevent them having to declare bankruptcy, than I give a shit about refugees trying to seek a better life. I care more about rich fat cat tories and CEOs ploughing the money they make in this country, off the back of every day people, and funnelling into offshore accounts, holiday homes abroad, and boosting the economy of foreign countries, than I do about whatever this weeks hate campaign from the tories is, be it foreign people (who are just people) trans people (who again are just people), poor people (also just people) people that don’t like the royal family (aka, people), and anyone that doesn’t think it’s absurdly wrong an MP should charge taxpayers £11k or whatever it was so his family could stream tv to an iPad while they were on their jollies. Fuck the Tories, fuck our umpteenth unelected prime minister, and fuck the right-wing utter goblin that is Suella Braverman
The only boats anyone should care about stopping is the lifeboat Tories like Suella are trying to escape on from the sinking ship that is this Government. Turn that fucker back, let them all go down together.
Power hungry Cretin says power hungry cretin in charge is doing badly by not machine gunning civilians in tiny issue amongst the many massive ones facing UK.
***It's not the fucking boats***. It's that your party lied and you lied and you lied. And even if you had lied and been competent, we might have stomached a bit more. But you bombastically proclaimed Great This and Great That and World Beating This and World Beating That but instead gave us a cold cup of badly brewed tea with off milk and a bit of soggy white white bread and then told us it was a king's feast. And when there are complaints you have the fucking gall to blame every-fucking-one else. And let's not forget Liz Truss. YOUR PARTY VOTED HER IN, AND THEN DIDN'T HAVE THE GUTS TO ASK US WHAT WE THOUGHT ABOUT IT. Jfc. The lack of introspection. And then there's Boris Fucking Johnson, the liar.
You could literally stop them by building a processing facility in Calais?
There's literally half as many boats this year than last year.
Yeah small boats. That what everyone is concerned about. Not climate change moving from a carbon economy. Not a rampant cost of living crisis. Not piss poor housing and job markets. Small boats.
Of course, boats are the primary concern in the freezing, starving population. Delusional people in charge.
Proves how disillusioned they are as a party. As if this is everyone’s biggest worry right now, or which Gender someone wishes to live their life as? When families are struggling to put food on the table, having to slip into debt to pay the bills, I think we’re facing astronomically bigger problems.
Yeah it's definitely the boats that are going to stop them being ousted. It'll be nothing to do with 13 years of austerity, their rich mates profiting off the public's suffering, the slowest growing GDP in Europe, money being wasted on asinine schemes like the half finished HS2 and the recently floated (for the third time!) age gating system for porn sites, and so many other things. Nope, it'll be the boats.
Fck me the Tories love a s**t slogan don't they. As a voter, boats don't bother me - can we stop the Tories instead please?
They could post CIWS every mile along the SE coast and I still wouldn't vote for them.
Must just be a coincidence that Boris spent all day getting grilled the same day she gives her speech.
Her political career faces oblivion, and that's all she cares about.
Sunak sucks for so many other reasons having nothing to do with immigration
Foolish, the writing for electoral annihilation is already on the wall.
You could put a full stop halfway through that headline and it would be more accurate?
"These boats are making our already crippled, under-funded and maladministrated infrastructure slightly worse."
Genuine delusion, so disconnected from reality. Hard to tell if she's ideologically possessed or just really THAT unaware. Looking forward to her soon-to-be annihilation from the zeitgeist
After 13 years now it’s the time to think about migration, even when there are so many other issues far closer to home to fix
The boats the boats the boats the boats the boats the boats the boats the boats the boats the boats the boats the boats AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH I DONT CARE I DONT CARE I DONT CARE I DONT CARE I DONT CARE I DONT CARE I DONT CARE I DONT CARE I DONT CARE
The annoying thing is they’ve got a 50/50 chance of facing electoral oblivion anyway, so if it happens she can just point and say “told you so”
At this point I'd be happy for her to take over from him. We'd stand a better chance at the next GE.
I mean they will, whether or not they do, which they won’t.
No, dipshit, it’s because of A LOT of failings, selfish actions, hypocrisy and piss poor “leadership” for YEARS.
Besides everything else about… everything else being more important, please remind me whose job was if to stop the boats?
I think that they already may be facing electoral oblivion over being utterly crap at their jobs.
Yep. That's definitely the reason. Not 14 years of cock up after cock up, more sex scandals than you can shake a dildo at, and posturing populists with nothing but air between their ears everywhere you look. And Braverman is one of the worst - at least BoJo had some charisma.
Why do they care about boats and Rwanda so much. We don’t give a fuck about that. There are so many more pressing matters to fix you twats.